Tag Archives: zombie

My son was lucky enough to be given an HO scale model train layout on long-term loan. It has 10 switches, a bridge, and came with an assortment of buildings. But somehow, it was still a little plain.

There was a large open area that my son decided needed a lake. Now I will show you the process of how we created the lake. This is what I was up to while I was finishing Angry Macey and why I had no time to blog.

ECO ALERT: The great news about this project is we made it with almost entirely recycled materials!

First I begged my husband to retrieve a piece of scrap wood out of the rafters of the garage for me. Then I had to clean off said wood. Then I put it on the layout and did a rough estimate of where I needed to cut. Use the appropriate saw to make the job easier. (I did not.) Sand rough edges.

I present to you Guitar Lake, so named because, well, it looks like a guitar.

Guitar Lake

Then we painted it blue, darker in the deep spots. We painted it white where the current from the lake dumps in.

Guitar Lake painted

Next we decorated it to our liking. This is where you can have the real fun!

I insisted I would only help him with this project if I could put the Loch Ness Monster into the lake. Then I had to explain what the Loch Ness Monster was. I painted an outline of his body coming out of the dark depths of the lake. Then I glued down a small wooden peg. I cut the head off of a dollar store dinosaur for the head. The buoys are painted wooden stakes. Watch out for the electric eel and the shark. There is a pop can because my son said to be realistic, the lake needed litter.

We began adding painted and physical accessories. Beware the Loch Ness Monster who guards the sunken pirate ship and its treasure!

We coated the surface of the water with Mod Podge. (Beware, Mod Podge remains sticky to the touch and may attract dust. But, it is also pretty inexpensive for a project such as this.) We used more Mod Podge to glue sand for a beach, pebbles, and small rocks for the shore. I wish I had built up the beach a little more, because much of the sand fell off after the glue dried.

To be thrifty, we collected the sand and rocks from outside, then baked them in the oven to kill any bugs because, bugs–YUCK.

The lake laid in place with the river.

A view from the deep end, complete with Hot Wheels boat.

My husband said we needed a mermaid. I just happened to have one of those laying around the house.

A view from the beach. Swimmers beware the mermaid’s song.

And that completes the lake project.

But, in the meantime, we came in possession of two train cranes within 24 hours: one functional, one not. You know me, I had to find a use for the broken crane. Taking a cue from many other more sophisticated layouts we have seen, I decided to age the crane. I started with some graffiti. (I Googled graffiti generators until I found a design I liked.) I added rust and dirt with acrylic craft paint as well.

Damn hoodlums, vandalize everything in the whole damn railyard.

I glued on some moss to make it seem as if it had not moved in a very long while. Here is a side by side comparison of the good crane vs. the broken one.

New vs. Aged

Then my husband had a great idea to make a whole abandoned track.

Sad, abandoned track

It was so fun that my husband decided to age his own engine (not pictured here). I have no doubt we will be aging more non-functioning stock in the future.

I ordered this book from Amazon several months ago. It traveled around my house. I finally got a spot of time to read this delightful story.

Click here to purchase

The Weirdest Family is a children’s chapter fantasy book that focuses on a family made up of Abby the mom, Charlie the dad, Tesi the teenager, and Eliza precocious little sister. This book tends towards supernatural flights of fancy, so it comes in handy that there is an unknown narrator to keep the story on track.

And I am pretty sure the author must like sandwiches and nachos and fruit. They are mentioned several times.

You might think that you cannot have a gratifying book that includes zombies, vampires, mummies, super senses, God, and a baby man-eating bat. There are also aliens, and an apocalypse. But, once Tesi gets a palace for her birthday, it all begins to come together. Because, after all, don’t the most unusual families live in palaces?

And just when you think the story has come to a close, you turn the page, start a new chapter and a new adventure. This book is truly fantastical.

I didn’t just stumble across this book. A good friend of mine, who happens to have only been 9 years old at the time of publication, wrote it. I could never have written anything this impressive (let alone long) at her age.

I cannot imagine being 9 years old and seeing my book that I wrote for sale on Amazon. (There was no Internet, and therefore no Amazon when I was that age.)

But I WANT TO. I hunger, thirst, ache, crave, yearn to have my writing displayed like that for the world to partake of. (Thank you, thesaurus.com.)

To sum up, the title says it all. This is, indeed, The Weirdest Family. I also found them quite entertaining.

If it is microwave hamburgers you are looking for, you do have a few choices still available in stores.

I had to go especially buy one to take a picture of for this post because, in the past, I kept eating them before I could get a picture.

Pita Cheeseburgers made by Kangaroo Brands, Inc. remind me a lot of MicroMagic burgers (I evaluated the cheeseburger variety for the sake of my hunger, and this post.) They still possess the microwave convenience that you enjoyed of yesteryear. I will warn you right off the bat you only get a half a burger per package. The burger is also quite thin, but this allows it to heat more evenly. It has a good fake-smoke taste. Since it comes in a pita, there is no bun to get overcooked. They are good to get your burger fix on, if you only want a half a burger. (I usually eat one for lunch, then supplement with chips or cookies.) If you are a big guy, you would definitely want to pack at least two into your lunch box.

They are good, but I must admit that the cheese-like substance on it that doesn’t melt in the microwave does disturb me.

Meijer Frozen Microwavable Cheeseburger

If you live where there is a Meijer store near you, you are in luck. Meijer had great frozen hamburgers, cheeseburgers, and chicken sandwiches. Great, ya know, considering it is a frozen, then microwaved highly processed burger.

What to do if that bothers you?

Put bacon on it!

Oh yes, they offer a bacon cheeseburger as well (Although the bacon does not come out of the microwave crispy:(

Nothing fancy here. They come on traditional sesame seed buns. and if you catch one of Meijer’s famous “10 for $10 and the 11th is FREE” sales, well, then that makes these burgers cheaper than pita burgers or McDonald’s–with the bonus that they will survive in your freezer for months! Perfect in case of an unanticipated zombie apocalypse.

Of course, there is always the option of White Castle frozen burgers. They satisfy my craving sometimes, but I feel like they are an acquired taste (READ AS: grease & onions).

Ore-Ida Extra Crispy Easy Fries

I believe the only major microwave french fries available right now are Ore-Ida Extra Crispy Easy Golden Fries. They are a good facsimile of the grease and cardboard taste of the old MicroMagic.

I knew of the burgers and fries listed above before I started this post. They are actually what made me nostaligic for the old MicroMagic of yesteryear. But I didn’t know of any companies currently selling microwaveable milkshakes in stores across the country. And even if there were, I do not think they would be as tempting to buy without the microwave fast food branded trifecta that MicroMagic represented.

Right down the road at my local grocery store, I was able to assemble this:

Yum! Nostalgia (As close at it gets, anyway!)

I taste-tested the chocolate milkshakes. They were good. I erred on the side of less microwave time, so it was still thick. It wasn’t super creamy, but definitely hit the spot. Well, the half of the cup I managed to wrangle away from M, my two-and-a-half year old anyway.

I also found a company called Cold Cow Ice Cream that is apparently putting in freezer/microwave combo display units in convenience stores across the country to satisfy your need for sweet that cannot be satisfied with candy bars or the usual ice cream novelties found in party stores, or the ice cream store that is likely right next door or down the block. I am very glad they did not have one of these in my store when I worked there. I would have eaten one every day. There website has a “milkshake finder” option to find the space age milkshake vending contraption closest to you.

Absolutely LOVE this pic. It is my current desktop on my puter. Photo: WarmBodiesmovie.com

This week I learned that Jesus was a zombie.

That is the whole point of Easter, right?

Celebrating when Jesus rose up as his zombie self to prove their was undead life after death?

My family went to church this morning (Shhh, don’t tell my mother. She would highly disapprove.) We went because I found a super-cute Easter outfit for my son at Once Upon a Child. My mom always said “the only reason to get an Easter outfit is if you go to church.” So, if you look at it that way, it is kind of her fault.

We also went to see my asbestos friend and her family.

And because the church was having a potluck breakfast and Easter egg hunt. It would be my son’s first Easter egg hunt, in a relatively riot-free environment.

My husband didn’t realize they were going to have a regular service after. He ended up going in the nursery with my son and taking a nap (New job, screwed up schedule, remember?). I stayed to listen to the sermon for two reasons.

The first and biggest reason is that we usually attend the church events, but not Sunday service. And the few times a year we do attend Sunday services, the church either doesn’t collect an offering or collects it for some charity other than themselves. While that is nice, it doesn’t make good business sense. They need one of those drop boxes for donations. It would make them more susceptible to burglary, but I would give more often. So, I had to stay until they collected the offering.

The second is that it only seemed polite. Get breakfast and eggs and ditch? That didn’t seem nice. And my whole family came, it seemed like at least one of us should actually stay in the church area (I can’t remember what it is called) and listen to the sermon.

The pastor talked about how Jesus rose and stood right next to a chick he had known and she didn’t recognize him.

Um, maybe because he was a rotting re-animated corpse?

And, corpse or not, if he rose again, what happened to him then?

Did he just say “Hey dudes, I did it!” and disappear into colored vapor? Did someone have to exorcise him? Did they have to kill him again? Shoot him with a silver bullet? Cut off his head?

Ya, ya I know. I am a day late. And $10 short. But I spent that $10 on two good movies this week that I wanted to share with y’all.

For our 16 year dating anniversary, my husband and I went to see “Warm Bodies”.

Photo: Summit Entertainment

Originally, I wasn’t interested in seeing it because I thought it was just zombie romance. But then I found out it was also a COMEDY! The studio bills it as a zomb-rom-com. There was enough blood and guts to keep my husband happy and enough romance and humor to keep me happy. I would describe it as most like a coming-of-age/first-love movie, like was common in the 80’s. (It also has an awesome 80’s soundtrack.) With a few brains thrown in to remember that they are zombies.

My husband was fascinated by the new twist on zombies. Of course, he also will watch Twilight with me, so I have a keeper. We both agreed we would want to own “Warm Bodies” when it comes out on DVD.

I also got the chance to go see “Safe Haven” with my Sister-in-Law. It was better than I expected. I am always leary of Nicholas Sparks movies. I still haven’t forgiven him for killing off Mandy Moore in “A Walk To Remember”.

This movie had a twist ending also, but it didn’t p*ss me off like “A Walk To Remember”. When the twist came, I realized my mom had read the book and told me that the twist ending had p*ssed her off. But as I didn’t realize she had already told me about it, it was a surprise to me, making the movie a little more interesting than if it had just been about the abused girl running from an abusive husband.

And now I think I need to dye my hair blond and cut it off into layers. Opinions?